On January 25 2012 10:58 r.Evo wrote:On January 25 2012 06:25 sMi.EternaL wrote:
I very rarely post in these types of threads. Emotions usually run high and opinions are always fickle beasts. That being said, since this is actually an area in which I am very familiar I will try to shed some light on the situation for those saying this is an unjustified shoot.
A little background first. I am a former Marine weapons instructor and am now a private sector weapons instructor. As someone that teaches officers what to do in this situation I can say that this is an absolutely justifiable shoot.
In the Law Enforcement/Military world you are taught to shoot to stop the threat. Stop the threat means exactly that. There is no sugar coating a threat engagement, in high intensity situations like this your brain stops and your training takes over. This is called a "Body Alarm Response," your previous highest level of training literally takes over and often times you don't even realize what was happening until after the fact. This officer did exactly what he should have done and fell back on his training and by doing so potentially saved the life of his partner. His initial burst did not drop the suspect, as you can see he's still standing, they have no way of knowing what kind of weapons systems he is carrying on his person other than the object in his hand. You either put the threat down and know you're safe or gamble with your life and the lives of those around you. How horrible would you feel if you were this officer, you shot your initial rounds and then stopped giving the suspect time to pull his pistol from his waistband and kill your partner? It happens, and so we train to make sure that does NOT happen.
I personally teach every student I've ever trained that his main priority is to make it home safe. Your wife/kids/husband/partner are expecting you & counting on you. If someone is coming at you/friend/family, you drop them absolutely. You never shoot to kill but you always shoot to stop the threat, in most cases this will kill the individual but that is never our intention. Hindsight and outside perspective is extremely skewed in these types of situations.
As far as being able to justify a shooting you have to be able to say to yourself, DAM! DAM is Desire, Ability and Means. This suspect displayed desire, he was well within range/had the capability to end that officers life and he definitely had the means.
Food for thought: In most states if a person puts their bare hand into their pocket/paper bag/anything and even IMPLIES that he has a gun, you are well within your rights to shoot that person in self defense. If a person walks into a bank and tries to rob it in this manner he still gets assault with a deadly weapon/armed robbery etc charges. And those cases happen more frequently than you might think. In this case the suspect very obviously had a weapon and displayed an attempt to use it. Training kicked in and that was all she wrote.
Hi there.
I kinda feel the need to respond to your post since it's being quoted as high quality and therefore supposedly the highest post from the "this shoot is justified" position. I am no weapons instructor or ex-marine. However, I am training in various martial arts since about 8 years total, I have trained with several police officers and had instructors with a background ranging from ex-military to ex-special ops. I have also received training on small arms and the topic of "When does which situation call for a complete escalation?" is something everyone in this sector should be familar with.
Coming from a martial arts and no military background I am able to use weapons like swords, knives or baseball bats (which is probably the best comparison to the suspects crowbar) and I therefor know how they work and how they don't work.
There is no sugar coating a threat engagement, in high intensity situations like this your brain stops and your training takes over. This is called a "Body Alarm Response," your previous highest level of training literally takes over and often times you don't even realize what was happening until after the fact.
I completely agree. This should be the goal of any physical training in this departement. However
the suspect in this short film is by no means displaying the intention to attack the policeman. He turns. He jumps towards the cop like a boxer, having his weapon in a position ready to strike. As scary as that might look,
he is in no position to actually swing that weapon properly against the officer. He holds the crowbar at the bottom end. While this part is technicly "correct" for a blunt weapon like this (think baseball bat) he has the weapon in one line with his body, the right hand above and behind his left hand, the heavy point of the weapon at neck height. If this was a Katana (which would be balanced right above his right hand), he could instantly strike and hurt someone. Since this however is a crowbar, to swing it at the officer he would have to:
a) lunge out behind his back (backwards motion) to then swing at the officer (think baseball-batter).
b) tilt the crowbar to the (from him) right side and then turn his body to swing it from right to left.
c) apply pressure with his right hand to swing it downwards.
a) and b) are easy to spot (we're talking 1-2s+ reaction time each) and are imo the correct moment to shoot at him.
c) is (remember, we're talking crowbar and not katana here)
incredibly slow, even for someone with huge strength (his right hand would have to be higher up the crowbar to do this with speed since the balance point is at the other end of that thing) and, in case he actually moves the right hand up in preparation, (hint: again a sign to shoot at him) incredibly short range compared to the distance the officer has to him at that point.
What I'm seeing from this video, concerning the officers responses
is that both are badly trained and overreacting.The officer who is "under attack" (let's call him A) misses his taser shot,
walks towards the suspect while fiddling around in his pocket and not looking at the suspect, then looks up and his first reaction is not drawing his weapon. It's not stepping outside of range. It's not evading a potential fatal blow. It is making a jump backwards and ducking because he's afraid (if the suspect would have swung his crowbar while turning, his head would be right in its way. Good job, well played). His reaction is not that of a person trained in close combat. It's the same reaction any untrained civilian would show.
B sees the suspect getting into a position from which he is not able to take action against his partner (see above), but a position that
looks scary - I completely agree. If his Body Alarm Response is to shoot the second something LOOKS threatening then he is either horribly trained or mentally not fit for the job. He does not understand or realize that the suspect was
threatening to hit his partner, but not (yet)
intending to do so. If he WANTED to smack his face in while having a gun pointed in his face he would have hit the second he turned around, WITHOUT getting his weapon in the above mentioned "ready position". (He could have easily just turned around while swinging the weapon, most likely hitting A pretty damn hard and without any handgun in the world stopping him from doing so.
Remember: A wasn't even looking at him because he was busy with getting his taser back into his pocket.)
Not realizing or understanding this crucial difference as officer B makes shooting the suspect a horrible call.
As someone who has been in fights before and has seen fights before, I am absolutely certain that the suspect in that video did not intend to hit the officer at the moment shots were fired, he intended to threaten him. Was it stupid? Yes. You don't fucking threaten someone while his buddy has a gun in your face.
Was his threat a justification to open fire on him? No way.PS: If anyone comes up with "yeah but you can't analyze that in the moment while it's happening" - THAT is what good training is about. As someone who is carrying a weapon you have to be able to make very close calls within a very short time frame under high stress. If you aren't able to do that, you are not fit for the job. It's that simple.
My initial reaction while watching the video was pretty much "wtf he didn't want to hit anyone" when the shots were fired. Yes, I needed to rewatch the video multiple times to understand WHY this was my initial reaction, however it is still the reaction of someone who is trained to correctly read such a situation and to avoid anyone involved getting hurt more than they should be. Even if I take the training I recieved when it comes to actual bodyguarding into account this is still NOT the situation where you have to go all out to save someones ass.
PPS: I would love to hear what the police officers actually said to the suspect. If I missed any kind transcript in the thread, please tell me so.
EPT
